Directed by Noah Baumbach The Squid and the Whale is a film about a family who is going through some tough times due to a recent divorce. The father Bernard Berkman is a novelist who has been on a dry spell between his published books and is going through some tough times. His wide Joan has cheated on him before and has recently decided that they should get a divorce. This was a long time coming because Joan has been unhappy for a long time and finally decided it was time to part ways. Their two sons Walt and Frank are sat down and told the horrific news, they can’t even imagine what is going to happen to their lives. The parents setup days where they will spend the days with each other but one thing seems to be clear, neither of the kids like what is going on which is understandable. Soon Bernard is all moved out and has joint custody of the kids and things start to get a little more serious. Its clear to see that Walt is taking sides with his dad and Frank seems to like staying with his mother more. But both the parents are very stringent with their days with the kids and don’t want to compromise. Soon the kids start to act up and start losing focus in school and start to act out. Frank starts to drink beer and picks up some sexual habits as well as generates a very colorful vocabulary for a child of his age. Walt on the other had meets a girl and they are getting along easily in the beginning but things start to get a little hairy. He goes to party and almost has sex with this girl but they cat it short and decide to wait for a little while. Prior to this one of Bernard’s students moves in with him and they start to develop a sexual relationship. Things start to get a little confusing when we realize that Walt also has an attraction to this girl that lives with his dad. But things progress and Walt is playing a song that he supposably wrote in the talent show, which he wins $100 dollars for. But Things start to catch up with him and the school realizes the song is actually by Pink Floyd. On the other hand Frank is caught masturbating in the school and rubbing semen on another child’s locker. Tension is also building between Bernard and Joan as they try and figure out what is going on with their children. One thing is for sure though, things are not looking to good for this once seemingly sound family. Walts want to cut things off with him and Sophie, the girl he almost lost his virginity to must has some from Bernard because convinced him to try things with other girls. This came as a surprise to me because Bernard does not seem like the type of man to give that kind of advice. “There are a number of reasons Walt breaks up with Sophie—mostly obviously to live up to Bernard’s self-serving ideal of youthful sexual prowess, but also, perhaps, because he can’t stand Sophie knowing that he’s a work in progress” (Asch). This must have come from the fact that Bernard stayed faithful to a woman that betrayed him for another man. And the fact that he had the chance to be with other allegedly beautiful woman when his last book was released. But Walt starts seeing that his father was not in a good place to give advice about women when he sees a school shrink because he was suggested to by the school. Wants brother Frank is also going through a deeper character change, he starts out as a innocent little boy and picks up some strange habits. He starts drinking beer probably as a method of dealing with what is going on just as many adults resort to when they are faced with difficult problem. His interest in sexual activities perplexed me at first but then I started to believe that he was getting it from seeing his mother and his new lover. Both of these brothers turned into completely different people by the end of the film. Throughout the film I began to notice that the camera always stayed close to the people of interest. Whenever there was a scene that was important the camera would stay close to the faces of the person at bay. I think this was done to really get into the actors role and feel what they were feeling because this film involves a lot of emotion and character difficulties as well as character progression. “Cinematographer Robert Yeoman stays close to the characters—a necessary visual strategy for a relatively shoestring 80s-set period piece that couldn’t clear Park Slope’s streets of contemporary cars (there are no establishing shots in The Squid at the Whale, as there would be none in Margot at the Wedding)” (Asch). This was really important to do because you feel entrapped in the film, as if you’re apart of the film. Almost as if you’re in the room with the actors, which was a great feat to achieve. I think this film was a good way to achieve and show off what can be done with good actors and great talent. All the small details begin to add up to a bigger picture which is obviously a great deal. The way that the scenes and difficulties were presented within were extremely relatable to many viewers that actually have had to deal with a separation of parents, and I think that is what brings together a great film. Nearly, all of the characters that started in this film went through some sort of change that affected them on an emotional level.
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Carol by Todd Hayness is a movie that was based on a romance novel from the 1950's. This film is is about two women, Carol Aird and Therese Belivet. These two women meet in a department store in New York where Therese works. They meet because Carol is looking for a christmas present for her young daughter and Carol asks her what she would want if she were a little girl. Carol is shopping for a doll but Therese tells her she she would never want a doll if she were a little girl, Therese recommends a train set and Carol takes it. She has it delivered to her house but Carol leaves her gloves at the counter that she checked out at. I think Carol did this on purpose so she would have a reason to see therese again. At the time this seemed like no big deal but later it seems like this was where the spark between the two happened. Therese, being a good person mails the gloves back to Carol using the paperwork Carol filled out in order to get the train set delivered. Carol is going through a difficult divorce at this time and she seemed to be attracted to the opposite sex as we find out later in the film. Carol receives the gloves in the mail and call the store that Therese works and requests to talk to Therese. She calls stating she "just wanted to say thank you for returning her gloves", but we know that was not the only reason. Carol offers to take Therese out for lunch without giving Therese a moment to decline. The two go out to lunch and learn a little more about each other, and it's clear that Therese is not in her place of comfort because she is a very closed person. Carol invites Therese to her home in New Jersey and they stop and get a christmas tree and therese takes pictures of Carol and they go about their way. Once they get the the house Carols husband arrives and starts to get suspicious of the two because Carol had an affair once before. They meet next at Therese's apartment and Carol surprises her with photographer gifts that include a new camera. But Carol has a larger problem on her hands, she discovers that her husband is requesting full custody of their daughter though a "morality clause" and she may lose her daughter completely. The support for this is that Harge, Carols husband is threatening to expose her homosexuality. Carol decides to take some time away from everything and go on a road trip, she asks Therese to go with her. The two head out on this trip and things start to get even more serious between the two. On New Years Eve is when things get really serious. The two get physical for the first time and discover the the traveling salesman that the two met was actually a private investigator Harge hired to expose the truth between the two. Carol has to much to lose and goes to her suitcase and pulls out a gun. She threatens the Tucker to give her the tapes, but Tucker had already sent them off to their rightful place. Carol fires the gun at the tape recorder but draws a blank. The two go to Chicago and try to figure out what has just happened. Therese wakes up the next day and discovers Carol has flown home to fight for the custody of her daughter and things get dicey. Compared to The Children's hour this film is far ahead of its time based on the time period during the film. "But Haynes’s genius is in the ways he taps into universal anxieties about love and relationships without ever letting go of the sense of imprisonment that came with being gay in the 1950s" (Sims). This was a huge part of the film because I was not expecting such actions from a film that was based in an older time. If this was a film in today's time this would still cause controversy but still be alright to put on the big screen, just as this film did. The consequences of their actions and what the two had to lose was never forgotten throughout the film because even though the two were doing their own thing, they never relieved themselves of what they left behind. This was a key feature of the film because this was a huge deal in the 40's and 50's and Haynes never let you forget what was at stake and what could happen if the world found out. “He’s known for shooting through windows, for using reflection. His work is impressionistic: these exquisite frames, and then that blown colour palette, muted overall with flashes of colour" (Leszkiewicz). The camera work and color of this film reflected exactly what was going on throughout. during the beginning of the film when Carol and Therese are in the department store I immediately knew that this film was not going to end well for anyone because of the color choices in the film. Every all the colors in the film reflected the mood, seriousness, and feel that Haynes was trying to get across. "The film’s cinematographer, Ed Lachman, was awarded the Golden Frog, the top award at Poland’s Camerimage Film Festival, which is devoted to the art of cinematography. The jury declared it a film of “aristocratic grace and elegance,” noting its “delicate and precise exploration of emotion through color and light” (Leszkiewicz). I think this award was rightfully deserved because I don't notice much during a film but even I noticed how much work must have been put into this piece of the puzzle. In all honesty, I think this film was extremely well executed. The way that you know exactly what these two ladies are up to based purely off the lighting was enough for me to like this film. And add in the fact that the film never lets you forget what they are doing and what the consequences would be is crazy. I honestly have never experienced a film that does these two aspects so well.
The Children's Hour by William Wyler must have been what I can only assume as extremely controversial of its time. Even in today's time this is a very touchy subject and people have very hard feelings for the topic. But nonetheless, the film starts out with two women by the name of Martha and Karen. The two were college classmates and now they both run a all girls school. Towards the beginning of the film they both seem to be doing well with their school and all is well. But one courageous child is about to have a monstrous impact on their lives. Mary is a young girl who has proven to be very problematic and cannot seem to stay out of trouble. Mary loves to bully her classmates, one in specific. But that is not the extent of her shenanigans, she loves to eavesdrop and that was one of her biggest problems during this film. One night while Mary was supposed to be asleep she heard and saw Martha and Karen in Martha's room discussing Karens new planned wedding date, which was fast approaching. But Mary witnessed something completely different, she thought nothing of it at the time. The next day when she was punished for lying, she took a taxi to her grandmother's house and told them that she was essentially being singled out. Mary's grandmother did not approve of her choices and took her back to the school. But Mary did not want to go back so she told her grandmother what she had witnessed the night prior to this ordeal. She told her grandmother that she essentially witnessed Martha and Karen doing things to each other that women should not be doing. This sparked an outrage with Mary's grandmother and she immediately disapproved of her granddaughter going back to this school ran by two very inappropriate women, or so she thought. Over the following days the school in which Martha and Karen had high hopes for emptied itself out completely. All the children had left because of what little Mary had told her grandmother. Mary's grandmother called the parents of each child that went to the school and told them what was going on. This sparked an outrage with all the other parents as well and they all sent for their kids to be picked up. Martha, Karen and Joe (Karens soon to be husband) all tried to tell Mary's grandmother that this was all a misunderstanding and that Mary had not understood what they were talking about. But she was not buying any of it, she even had Mary come and confirm what she had heard but Mary was cornered into the lie. Mary mentioned that one of the girls at the school had told her what she saw and that she herself had never actually seen or heard anything. And that girl was Rosalie Wells, who happened to be staying with Mary and her grandmother until her mother was able to pick her up. She they questioned Rosalie and she told the truth at first but Mary blackmailed Rosalie into lying and the truth was never revealed. Much time went on and Karen and Martha took Mary's grandmother to court and tried to sue her for ruining their lives, but the one person they needed to win the case never showed up. That person was Martha's aunt, and she was one of the reasons Mary heard what she thought was inappropriate behavior for women. Nearly a full summer went by and Karen and Martha couldn't even leave their house because everyone knew what they had did or thought they did. Even Karens fiance questioned if this whole situation was real and that's when Karen said they needed time apart. But the truth was revealed when Rosalie told her mother what really happened and Mary's grandmother confronted Mary about everything. The grandmother went to Karen and Martha's house to apologize and make everything right again but the two ladies turned everything down. Nothing would ever be the same for them again and both of them knew it especially Martha. We find out that she really did have inappropriate feelings for Karen and she did not know what to do about it. But that was one of the last things we hear from Martha because she decides to end her own life. Back when this movie was released it was still very controversial but things were starting to become a little more acceptable and this was the first time as far as I know that someone had came out on the big screen. "First, you have someone actually coming out in the screen; admitting that she is a lesbian, that she deeply feels the love that dare not speak its name" (Bratchwaite). This actually surprised me during the film because even though I know nothing about films I knew this whole movie must have caused quite the stir because of its topic. Then add in a scene where someone is literally coming out on the big screen, this must have been a big moment in Hollywood. This film seems to have broken many rules of its time because more than one outstanding thing happened during the course of this film. On one had a women admitted her love for her female best friend and on the other she then decided to kill herself because that was not an accepted norm of their time. "In The Children's Hour, the realization of lesbian desire leads one character to suicide this appearing to equate homosexuality with pathology" (Glass). Comparing the desire of the same sex to a mental problem was and still is a big ordeal because this movie tries to show that it is a mental problem while at the same time bringing this topic to the big screen. We never see anything happen but from the beginning of the film you can tell this is an issue that cannot be fixed and somehow this is going to end badly for one of the two or both. I think that this movie was a movie that needed to be made because it brought to attention many things. Firstly, it brought to attention the issue of homosexuality during that time. Secondly, it brought to attention that homosexuality may be a mental problem. This was big because a topic like this was a very large problem during that time and this film handled the topic very well. I really think that if a film comparable to this one was produced today that it would be a huge hit because this a topic that still is in the works today.
Before Midnight is the final part as far as we know to this series. Richard Linklater has created a series that leaves viewers wondering for more. In this edition of the series we start off with Jesse dropping his teenage son off at an airport in Greece to fly back to Chicago. He is flying to Chicago because that's where his mother lives. Nearly another ten years have passed since we last saw the pair and even more has changed since then. Celine and Jesse are now married and have twin girls. They live in Europe and Jesse is still a successful writer and Celine is considering a government job. Clearly a lot has changed once again and that's the general theme with these movies because it leaves the viewer hanging and asking for more. The aspect of time seems way less prominent in this film compared to the others. We meet with the family as they are about to leave on a vacation and all we know is they will be at the vacation spot for a little while. While watching I couldn't help but lose track of what the time frame was or how long it had been since the last major event in the film. I think since they are much older and have two kids now that are living a slower paced life so there was no need to emphasis on time.
Comparing Jesse and Celine now reveals a different outcome compared to the last time we saw them together. Jesse seems to be the one thats troubled this time around, he is caught between his son and his now new family. And during the end he seems to be tired of Celine and her nagging, which changes the way we look at Jesse. We also discover that Jesse had an affair with another woman while he was on a trip for his book. That really changes the way we look at him. He used to be this dreamy man for Celine now suddenly he isn't. This series of films was a great way to look at the difference between time in reality and time in a film. The way these were film really makes you believe that something like this actually happened and we are watching it from the stands. The character development was a major aspect of this series as well because, this series of filmed over a span of nearly 20 years. The development and changes in the characters were not only physical but mental and emotional. This was a huge part of the movie and it was well worth the 9 years. Before Sunset by Richard Linklater picks up where Before Sunrise left us. Jesse and Celine have been apart for nine years and they have a lot to catch up on and they cant get to it soon enough. Celine discovers Jesse was waiting for her at the train station when she couldn't make it to the date they were set to meet again. She feel extremely bad for Jesse but her grandmother had passed away days prior to the meeting date and she could not make it. But they soon get past that and start to discuss the changes in their lives in the past nine years. Jesse has gotten married and has one child, as well as wrote a book. They book describes the magical 24 hours he and Celine had spent together nine years prior. Celine on the other hand hasn't done too much in terms of starting a family. We discover she has dated a few other men and nothing has worked in her favor. But regardless this was the start to another in depth movie. We also get to look at how the two characters have changed as people. Based off of the first film the viewer would have thought that Jesse was never the type to settle down and get married as well as have a child. But he felt that was expected of an american man and he went ahead and did it, he never forgot about Celine though. The two characters seemed to have switched places in this aspect. Celine is the one I would have expected to get married first and it hasn't worked out for her. She goes on a rant about how she never forgot about Jesse and no matter who she sees they aren't the same as him. This was a shocking moment for me during the film because she did not appear to be this troubled in the beginning of the film.
"They walk out of the bookstore and around the corner and walk, and talk, and the director Richard Linklater films them in long, uninterrupted takes, so that the film feels like it exists in real time" (Ebert). This was a big factor that I noticed heavily in this film. I felt that the long takes were really testing my patience, I was constantly wondering whether the scene was going to end rather than focusing on the context of the scene. This feature adds to the matter of making it feel like we are apart of the film but I cant see it continuing to other films. I think this film was better than the first because it emphasizes the reason that Before Sunrise was made. While watching Before Sunrise I didn't really understand what the point of having long scenes and such a close look at two people's lives was but once I realized that this was part of a very long experimental series and the idea immediately grew on me. This is a series of movies that is all about time and how to bring it to light. We begin with a man and a woman on a train by the names of Jesse and Celine. They dont know each other yet, but the next 24 hours has much in store for them. They are brought together by a woman who is speaking very loudly and the book Celine is reading. They make their way to the cafe car of the train and exchange information about each other and their short relationship snowballs from there. The film really focuses on the advancement of the two main characters as they progress through the 24 hours that will change their lives forever. We as the audience get to see this well constructed view of how these two build the foundation for the next two films that are to come. Linklater used many different aspects to portray the timeline of Jesse and Celine. Time for example is the biggest factor, and very important one to continue with these films. One of the best ways was the use of the sky. Many movies have attempted to use daylight to show that time has passed but Before Sunrise was the first movie that I have seen that actually stayed true to the time compared to daylight. When the film starts, it was a sunny morning and when it ends they are advancing to the next morning. This was a big element in making this film more believable and Linklater hit the nail on the head. "The European exoticism helps give Before Sunrise a time-capsule feel" (Sims). I think this is what Linklater was trying to accomplish with this series of films. The view the audience has on these two is hard to describe. Everything flows perfectly, there are no hiccups in the script, and no flaws in the timeline. We seamlessly follow these two through the beautiful city of Vienna, without a hitch. This part of the movie seemed to perfect to me but I guess the next two films have many problems which affected the parts of the film that we dont see and the parts of the movie that we do see. "You couldn't make the same movie today without feeling shamelessly twee" (Sims). I highly agree with this because the time period that this was filmed in allows for strangers to meet and develop a relationship. In present time this movie would have felt too artificial and constructed. But Linklater found a way to make this series very natural and flow extremely well.
The Virgin Suicides is a film that takes you on a rollercoaster of emotions. Directed by Sofia Coppola, the film goes into the lives of the Lisbon family and find out what happened. The film starts out with Cecilia, the youngest of the five sisters in a bathtub. It appears that she is dead from cutting her wrist but the ambulance comes and saves her. After that the doctor recommends that Cecilia become more social. Now this was a great feat to overcome because Mrs. Lisbon was like a prison warden. During the film I actually wondered if prison would be better that living in that house. But surprisingly Mrs. Lisbon let the girls have a party in the basement. The party started off very awkward but it soon began to pick up and when it did Cecilia asked to be excused. It was easy to see that she did not want this party and non of her emotions had changed. So, she left the party and walked upstairs. Shortly after there was a loud thud sound from outside. Cecilia had jumped out a window onto one of the spikes of a fence in their front yard. The neighborhood tries to help the family by sending flowered and ripping out the fence that Cecilia landed on.Everyone in the family tries to get back into their normal lives and forget about what happened to their sister. Mr. Lisbon jumps back into his job as a school math teacher and the rest of the girls try and forget but everyone at school knows what happened. But the prettiest sister Lux, meets the most desirable guy in the school and he invites himself over to their house to watch T.V. with the family. Trip Fontaine spent the night awkwardly sitting next to Mrs. Lisbon and only occasionally got a glimpse of Lux's feet. The night ended and Trip sat in his car reviewing the night failure but Lux's ran out and started kissing him. Trip really liked Lux and wanted to ask her to homecoming, so he asked Mr. Lisbon for approval. But he denies and says it would be unfair to change the rules because the older girls had to follow them. So Trip comes up with the idea to take all of the sisters, the football team is going to take them. This idea gets approved by Mrs. Lisbon surprisingly given her dictator ways. the night comes and the girls are all ready for their night. The three boys from the football team that Trip and chosen are seemingly respectable kids. The night progresses and Trip and Lux are voted king and queen after that they are nowhere to be found. They made their way to the football field and got a little handsy. The first of the Lisbon girls were taken home by their dates and Lux was nowhere to be found. She woke up on the field and Trip was nowhere to be found and by this time it was early morning. So Lux took a cab home and was yelled at by Mrs. Lisbon. After that whole incident the girls were taken out of school and put on house arrest. Over the next few months the Lisbon house deteriorates and not a single person is seen leaving the house. But as spring comes around a few men come to cut down a tree in their front yard and all the girls come running out and circle around the tree. This was the first time anyone had seen them in months. The boys who are the ones telling this story start receiving notes from the girls and engage in phone calls in which they exchange music. The boys received one final note, the note asked for their help. When they got to the Lisbon house Lux was smoking in the living room and instructed the boys to wait there for the other girls as she walked into the garage and started the car. The boys get suspicious and start exploring the house and discover that all the girls had killed themselves. The character development throughout this film was pretty obvious, at the beginning of the film it was Cecilia because she tried to kill herself twice and succeeded on the second attempt. The other sisters were not as pretty or as outgoing as Lux so she was seemingly the next main focus of the film. Lux seemed to be the most interesting of the five sister, she was always getting attention from boys, always trying new things, and she was the most outgoing of the bunch. I think that one of the biggest factors in the film was color. Throughout there was always a somewhat darker color scheme that set the mood for what was about to come. Even when you look at all the girls dresses from the homecoming dance. They all wore white, I think that represents that they are pure. Once thing I noticed was that whenever something bad was going to happen the lighting of the scenes beforehand got really dark, foreshadowing what was about to come. "Sofia Coppola’s slim but remarkably cohesive five-feature filmography has established a signature shot: the window gaze" (Koski). This shot was used many times throughout the film. It shows a sense of entrapment, which is what happened to these girls. Their mother trapped them under many rules and they just watched the world outside through the glass window. Another use of the camera that I believed was amazing, was the still shots that were used. They really helped the view understand the timeframe of this situation because you could see the house and yard deteriorate. I think this was a good film overall because it wasn't your conventional film. It was told from the people who saw things happen first hand and were actually somewhat involved in these girls lives. I think that the root cause was Mrs. Lisbon, she was crazy and controlling. the girls might as well have been in a prison. I would definitely watch another film like this.
Affliction by Paul Schrader is nothing short of a roller coaster of events. This is a movie that only Schrader could pull off because of its strange story-line, crazy acting, and in my opinion crazy ending. It all starts off with a police officer of a small town named Wade and his daughter driving to a Halloween party at the local school. Wades daughter is visiting him as he is divorced and she lives with her mother. We quickly find out that she is not very fond of her father and wants to go home. So, while inside she calls her mother to come pick her up from the party. When Wade finds out he becomes angry and you start to question if Wade is right in the head because he starts acting like a child in a way. In his anger he goes outside and hops in a car with a few acquaintances, they smoke a little weed and start talking about a man from the city. The man wants to shoot a buck and has hired a local hunter names jack to show him the ways. This seems like an irrelevant detail but it lays the track for the rest of the movie. After he gets back to the school where his daughter is waiting for her mother, he creates a scene in front of all the parents and kids. After this he decides that he wants to gain custody of his daughter and swears to himself he is going to get a lawyer. His girlfriend Margie seems to think this is a bad idea because his daughter is happy living with her mother. Which the viewer can clearly tell she is not very fond of her father. But Wade quickly gets side tracked by a situation that has just happened. Jack and the man from the city went hunting in the woods and only one of them made it back alive. Jack claimed that he was about to shoot a buck when he heard the man fall and the gun went off. Everyone besides Wade believes this story, he thinks there is more to this story. But in the mean time he takes his girlfriend to go visit his parents, who are very old at this point in Wades life. Throughout the film we see flashbacks of Wades abusive father and its clear to see that he hasn't changed his ways at all. But when they go upstairs to see his mother they discover that she died. After that Wades brothers and sister come to the wake and mourn in the death of their mother. But Wade and his brother have a conversation about what they think happened with Jack and the man who shot himself. Both seem to think there is reason to believe that Jack shot the man. So Wade tries to connect the dots but just ends up with a gun pointed to him and at the other end of the gun is Jack. He soon begins to act more violently and is not the same Jack at the beginning of the movie. Even Margie has had enough of him and decides to leave him and take his daughter who is visiting again back to her mothers house. The film ends with him unintentionally killing his father and Wade watching the barn that he set on fire with his fathers body in it. Schrader uses the technique of frame within frames throughout the film in many places. Using this technique allows the shot to have more depth and context. By holding one frame and having the objects move within it, it adds more focus to the object or person. This was used within the final scene of the movie where Wade gets into a argument with his father and unintentionally kills him and lights the barn on fire. He watches the burning barn from the kitchen table looking through a window while drinking just like his father would have done. This shot in my opinion was one of the best in the film because it incorporated the depth of the barn, and seriousness of the situation, and the fact that Wade seemed to not care anymore.
Wade starts to experience pain from a tooth about halfway though the movie. I think that this is linked his actions but as I was watching it I never noticed. Wades action throughout the film were always rash and quickly made, he never thought about anything, he just did it. A perfect example is when he pulled out his tooth, he didnt think about what could happen he just did it. The more I think about it the more I realize how much Wade angers me. He thinks and acts like a child, he never thinks about the consequences. Wade almost seemed like he had a mental disorder with how he acted. At the beginning of the movie when he was angry with his daughter for call her mom, he seemed to change emotion really fast. This kind of led me to think that there was something wrong with him. I think that this movie was interesting but nothing more than that. The storyline really had no point because in the end Wade never finds out if he was right or wrong. His daughter does not like him and his girlfriend leaves him, so what was the overall point of the movie. In my opinion this movie was more of a visually and appealing movie to watch rather than watching for the story. I would probably not watch this movie again, but I can completely understand why someone would watch it. The Mist is one of those movies that literally leave you on the edge of your seat. Directed by Frank Darabont, The Mist is definitely a movie that has you biting your nails throughout the entire movie. It all beings with a family that lives in Maine, and their house was just damaged by a bad storm. While the family is outside assessing the damage a strange fogs comes creeping across the lake but they think nothing of it and go on with their day. David and his son as well as their neighbor head to the store to pick up supplies to fix up their house. But that's where things start to get interesting. While everyone is in the store buying supplies for themselves, Jeff Miller comes running in and claims that there is something in the mist. By now the entire store is surrounded by this fog so there is no way out. David decides to go check the generator because there lights have gone out and discovers that its clogged. While he is in the loading dock he hears and sees the garage door banging, clearly something wanted to get inside. When he tells the others they don't believe him and the bag boy Norm, decides he is going to go outside and unblock the exhaust for the generator. But David knew that wasn't a good idea, and expressed his opinion. Everyone thought he was crazy and full of himself for thinking something non human could be out there. Almost as soon as Norm goes outside numerous tentacles grab him and he is gone, but David managed to cut one of the ends of the tentacles as proof of what is out there. When they tell the others what just happened, Davids Neighbor Brent, becomes insulted and thinks this is a big joke. Brent is not believing any of what has just happened and wants to see whats out there for himself. Brent and a few people decide that they want to go outside and see for themselves. Another man joins them to get a gun from another mans truck, attached to a rope in case things go south. And sure enough things go south, the rope starts flying out of everyone's hands, but they manage to get it reeled in and its covered in the blood of the man. Mrs. Carmody is a woman who is stuck in the store with everyone else, she is known as the crazy lady to this point in the film. She seems to think that this is the end of the world and that everyone who doesn't live by the word of god will be sent to hell by this mysterious fog. But everyone disregards her and continues to try and prepare themselves for the night they they are about to face. When night falls Mrs. Carmody has gathered a following and people are actually buying into what she is saying. This is becoming a problem because now David has people against him and that puts him and his son in danger. They begin to ask the only army soldier alive in the store if he knows anything and after some persuasion he confesses that this was all the army's fault and that they opened a door to another dimension. Mrs. Carmody thinks that since he is the cause of this (even though he really wasn't) that he must be sacrificed, and in the matter of seconds the poor soldier was stabbed by one of the store employees and thrown outside for the creature. By this time David has to many people against him and knows he must leave the store or he and his son will be sacrificed next. So he and a few other people who don't buy into Mrs. Carmodys beliefs gather supplies and attempt to leave but they are caught by Mrs. Carmody. And now she seems to be the one in charge, which was a huge change of powers. She demands Davids son be sacrificed next, but the only store employee that knows how to use a gun shoots Mrs. Carmody in the stomach causing everyone to back off. After this startling situation David and a few others pile into his car and begin driving. They drive to his home to discover his wife encased in spider webs, and then they drive until they can drive no longer. This film is very different from anything we have watched in class thus far. "Darabont used in-your-face camera operators who improvised around and among the cast as they shot and re shot their long, chaotic and exhausting scenes in real time. Darabont says it was sometimes more like filming a hectic and energetic stage play"(Patterson). It different because the camera is used in a very different way compared to any film we have seen yet. During the beginning of the movie we can see that the camera is not being moved around much and has smooth transition. But when we get to the store and the older man comes in with a bloody face, the whole mood and setting changes along with the way the camera is being used. All of a sudden the camera is frantically switching between people and that just adds to the craziness that is going on during the film. What I also noticed, was that even though this is a movie it sometimes looks as though the camera was being held by a bystander. Almost like it was design to make the audience feel like they are a character in the film.
Just as the camera angles change really quickly, so do the characters. If you look at nearly each character from the beginning to the end, not a single character is the same as when they started. Much of this has to do with the situation that they are put into but regardless, each character goes though a change. A perfect example would be Mrs. Carmody, at the beginning of the film she was some crazy lady that made no sense. And at the end of the film she was some sort of genius that knew the answer to save all the people who believed in god. And when you look at all the people that thought she was crazy go though this change and start doubting what David says and start believing what she is telling them. I have never noticed that with any other movie and I thought it was interesting because it showed how people can change based on the situation that they are faced with. When your life depends on it you may believe anything in order to stay alive. Overall, I think this was one of my favorite films we have watched in class so far. It had so much going on and the characters really made you mad or you loved them. Mrs. Carmody really made me angry at times and I think that's what a good movie should do. It should get into the viewers emotion and connect them to what they are watching. The Birds by Alfred Hitchcock was a very confusing film to say the least. Throughout the film I found myself asking what the purpose of this film could be but I could not seem to find the answer. But nonetheless, the film starts off with many black birds flying across the sky which was obviously a key part of the film, foreshadowing what is to come. Melanie Daniels was a person known to get herself into trouble and Mitch Brenner was a lawyer, the two found themselves in a bird shop and began talking. Mitch was in the bird shop to find his little sister lovebirds for a birthday present, and Melanie happened to be in the right place at the right time. When Mitch left she was intrigued by Mitch's charm and decided to buy lovebirds and take them to his residents. But she discovered the he goes to Bodega Bay over the weekends. She then proceeds to drive herself to Bodega bay and soon tracks down Mitch and discretely leaves the birds at Mitch's house but she doesn't go noticed. While she is rowing back to the boat rental dock she was attacked by a blackbird, this is where we get a first glimpse of what these birds are going to do. Melanie ends up staying the entire weekend and slowly everything starts going south. Soon, the bird attacks start occurring but become more and more frequent. It comes to a point where everyone in the town thinks that Melanie is the cause of this chaos in what is otherwise a peaceful town. But soon everyone begins to realize there is something going on that is much deeper than meets the eye. Eventually, the bird attacks become much stronger and begin to kill more people and even boarded up houses are no match for these psychotic birds. The film ends in a strange way because the birds don't attack Mitch and his family or Melanie as they are leaving town. But the real frustrating part was the viewer never finds out what was motivating the birds to cause so much terror. For much of this movie there is a bird in the scene and Hitchcock did a fantastic job making them look like they were the ones in charge. "Birds control the actions of the characters from the very beginning. The film’s first shot, which is an establishing frame of San Francisco, swoops down and picks up the motions of Melanie Daniels as she approaches a pet store" (Saporito). I think this was a key part of the film because it really brought to picture what was happening. It brought to attention of what was to come throughout the rest of the film. During the rest of the film, Hitchcock does a fantastic job making the birds look like they are the ones calling the shots. To when the birds are sitting and waiting on the jungle gym, to when they are sitting and waiting for the family and Melanie to leave at the end of the film. They were really the underlying makers of the film. This film is made up of a lot of foreshadowing and symbolism. I think that there was no greater form of foreshadowing than when Melanie and Mitch's mother meet for the firm time. Mitch's mother seems to have her doubts about Melanie and questions Mitch's choice in women. This raised a big red flag because whenever a mother disapproves of someone their son is seeing that's always a bad sign. His mother went as far as bringing up a incident that Melanie had while on vacation, but that was quickly dismissed as a act of revenge against her fathers newspaper company. Its made very clear from the beginning that Mitch's mother does not like Melanie and apparently neither do the birds. "It’s as if she brings this bird craziness upon them to rid their lives of Melanie, the potential threat to her family" (Boverg). This made so much sense to me after the movie because it makes you think about what the mothers role in the movie really is. All shes does in the movie is disapprove of Melanie and scream in an annoying manor when the birds attack. I think that this movie could have been made without her in it. But, nearly every time she sees Melanie and Mitch together, the birds attack shortly after.
"The lack of a score in this film totally makes you realize how alone you can feel among all these birds" (Boverg). I realized this about halfway through the movie and it confused me a little bit. This was the first movie I have ever seen that didn't have any sort of music playing throughout the movie. When the movie begins, there are birds chirping and it carries throughout the film. But during the beginning the viewer gets a sense that this is going to be a happy movie about two people who are attracted to each other but clearly that is not the case. The score of this film was created solely on the reliance of the evil birds, every time they attacked you would hear the terrifying shriek. This movie was definitely not my favorite, but now after writing about it I understand why we watched it. Its so different than any movie I have ever seen it made me look for differences. It made me think deeper about what each character was symbolizing and what was their significance to the plot of the movie. |
AuthorI normally only watch comedies and action movies so this should be an interesting change. Archives
May 2017
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